The Chronicles of SNB Brewing: SNB Brewhouse v3.5

Brewhouse v3.5

I’m so far behind on posts that this one is going to really cover three topics. The main topic will be the construction and testing of my flat brewing surface currently known as SNB Brewhouse v3.5. The other topics that will be lightly touched on are BSS aka Bitter Sweet Symphony Remixed and 35ish my annual “birthday” brew based on Kate the Great. Grouping all these together actually makes sense as they are really all part of figuring out how to brew on a flat surface.

It had been almost 6 months since I’ve brewed a beer at my own house. This was mostly caused by me stripping my previous system for parts for a new system while waiting for a flat brutus style stand to be built for me. Almost a month ago I got tired of not being able to brew at my house so I jerry-rigged together a brewing setup (dubbed Brewhouse 3.5) using my old headboard and pieces from my various set ups.

Helping to pull valves

It was pretty fun building a new manual flat surface brewhouse. I’d been playing with pumps before to move water and wort to different places but always had the ability to use gravity for certain steps. Going to a flat surface meant learning how to move liquid exclusively with pumps. To do this I needed to upgrade my hoses and connections to make moving wort more efficient. On the connection side I looked into the one handed quick disconnects and triclamps but decided to go with cam & groove fittings similar to the ones Shawn uses. The side benefit is when I brew with him I don’t have to worry about modifying either setup to get them to work together! For this setup I relied heavily on Brewers Hardware for a great selection of fitting, included the wide bore 1/2" Cam and Groove Coupler X High Flow 1/2" Hose Barb.

The other thing moving to a flat brewing setup meant that I would need to finally transition from batch sparging to fly sparging. I’ve been batch sparging as long as I’ve been all-grain brewing mostly because I didn’t have a HLT, well I had one (which will make its debut as a mashtun in Brewhouse 3.75) cut and drilled I just didn’t have it setup with the hardware.

Part of both learning to use pumps more efficiently in brewing and fly sparging meant valves valves and valves. Whereas before I only had 2 I now have valves of all shapes and sizes. Using them all really gives the feel of working in a larger scale brewery. It was also fun to get my daughter to help open and close valves. Part of learning to use valves was learning where to put them in reference to pumps. Basically you never want to restrict the flow of liquid into the pump which means only placing valves after the outflow.

34th while brewing 35ish

The one disappointment about moving to new hardware was that the chill plate Bonnie got me for my birthday the previous year won’t work anymore. It was designed to work with a hose barbs and a garden hose neither of which I could really adapt in my new system as you’ll see from the pictures. I ended up selling it and a pump I only used for cooling water to my mom and stepfather. I used the proceeds to buy a new larger 40 plate heat exchanger straight from Duda Diesel with 1/2" Male NPT to attach new fittings and a ball valve directly to it.

I still have some work to do in calibrating the new equipment and entering the values into BeerSmith for more accurate brewing. I have been coming up a little short on my preboil gravity but making up for it in my boil at the cost of being under my post boil volume. It would also help to brew some session level beers to help determine my new efficiency instead of the large beers I’ve been brewing. I don’t want to spend too much time right now as my new brew (probably Westbennetteren 12 b3) will be on Brewhouse 3.75 (stand without automation) and I have a pretty good feel for how it is preforming in its 3.5 configuration

Before I jet, let me briefly talk about the two “calibration” beers BSS and 35ish. BSS is the codename for Bitter Sweet Symphony Remixed which is a rebrew and retool of Bitter Sweet Symphony from last year. I wasn’t happy with how it turned out as a lager so I switched it to WLP007 and changed the rice to brewer’s sugar. Currently it’s on a strange journey that I right now don’t know how it will end up. 35ish is my annual birthday brew based on the Kate the Great recipe. It gains the “ish” this year as even though everything was set and ready to go on my birthday I wasn’t “physically able” to brew that day getting around to it a few days later on the 1st of January. It’s currently in a keg for a long cold secondary.

Cheers

-SNB

Bitter Sweet Symphony b2
Double IPA
Type: All Grain Date: 12/23/2013
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.00 gal
Brewer: Scott Bennett
Boil Size: 7.28 gal
Boil Time: 75 min
Equipment: SNB Brewhouse 3.5
Brewhouse Efficiency: 68.00 %

Beer Profile

Est Original Gravity: 1.092 SG
Measured Original Gravity: 1.098 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.017 SG
Measured Final Gravity: 1.020 SG
Actual Alcohol by Vol: 10.4 %
Bitterness: 121.1 IBUs
Est Color: 5.7 SRM
Calories: 343.1 kcal/12oz

Ingredients

Grist
9.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) US
5.25 lb Golden Promise
2.00 lb Oats, Malted
0.50 lb Carared

Hops
1.00 oz Citra [12.00 %] - Mash 60.0 min Hop
1.00 oz Citra [12.00 %] - First Wort 75.0 min
1.00 oz Warrior [15.00 %] - Boil 60.0 min
1.00 oz Citra [12.00 %] - Boil 20.0 min
1.50 oz Citra [12.00 %] - Boil 5.0 min

Yeast
6.0 pt Starter Dry English Ale (White Labs #WLP007) -

Dty Hops
2.00 oz Citra [12.00 %] - Dry Hop 7.0 Days

Misc
10.00 g Gypsum (Calcium Sulfate) (Mash 60.0 mins)
1.00 tbsp PH 5.2 Stabilizer (Mash 60.0 mins)
1.00 Items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 mins)
1.00 tsp Yeast Nutrient (Boil 15.0 mins)
1.00 lb Corn Sugar (Dextrose) [Boil for 15 min]

Mash Profile
Mash Name: Single Infusion, Medium Body
Mash In Add 5.48 gal of water at 168.3 F to hit 153.0 F for 60 min
Sparge Step: Fly sparge with 4.05 gal water at 168.0 F

35ish
Imperial Stout
Type: All Grain Date: 1/1/2014
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.00 gal
Brewer: Scott Bennett
Boil Size: 7.39 gal
Boil Time: 80 min
Equipment: SNB Brewhouse 3.5
Brewhouse Efficiency: 65.00 %

Beer Profile

Est Original Gravity: 1.102 SG
Measured Original Gravity: 1.106 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.018 SG
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 11.2 %
Bitterness: 70.0 IBUs
Est Color: 57.8 SRM
Calories: 351.7 kcal/12oz

Ingredients

Grist
16.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) US
0.90 lb Barley, Flaked
0.90 lb Special B Malt
0.90 lb Wheat Malt, Dark
0.80 lb Carafa III
0.70 lb Aromatic Malt
0.60 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L
0.60 lb Roasted Barley
0.30 lb Black (Patent) Malt
0.30 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt -120L
0.30 lb Chocolate Malt

Hops
1.00 oz Magnum [14.00 %] - Boil 75.0 min
0.70 oz Perle [8.00 %] - Boil 75.0 min
0.70 oz Styrian Goldings [5.40 %] - Boil 75.0 min
0.25 oz Centennial [10.00 %] - Boil 15.0 min
1.00 oz Palisade [7.50 %] - Aroma Steep 15.0 min
1.00 oz Styrian Goldings [5.40 %] - Aroma Steep 15.0 min
1.00 oz Willamette [5.50 %] - Aroma Steep 15.0 min

Yeast
6.00 pt Starter Dry English Ale (White Labs #WLP007)

Misc
1.00 tbsp PH 5.2 Stabilizer (Mash 60.0 mins)
1.00 Items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 mins)
1.00 tsp Yeast Nutrient (Boil 15.0 mins)

Mash Profile

Mash In Add 7.22 gal of water at 163.3 F to hit 149.0 F for 45 min
Sparge Step: Fly sparge with 3.10 gal of water at 168.0 F

Pictures